Hurricane Melissa Explodes In Caribbean; Is Dire Threat To Jamaica, Maybe Cuba

Forecast track and timing of Hurricane Melissa, which
is about to decimate the island of Jamaica. 

Jamaicans, and weather forecasters are waking up to a horror this morning. 

Hurricane Melissa is following the worst case scenario, having blown up from a tropical storm to a powerful hurricane packing 140 mph in a matter of less than 18 hours. 

Worse, the storm is still getting strong, still moving forward at a snails pace, and still locking in on Jamaica as a target.

Melissa is forecast to reach Category 5 intensity today, the strongest possible hurricane. It would be the third category 5 Atlantic hurricane this year, which is incredibly rare. Climate change doesn't seem to make hurricanes more frequent, but it does seem to make it more likely that some of them will reach intense Category 5 intensity. 

Fortunately, the other two Cat 5's of 2025, Erin and Humberto, did not hit land.

Our luck has run out with Melissa. 

As of this morning, Melissa was moving over water that is record hot, 88 or 89 degrees. This patch of water under Melissa is the warmest of anywhere in the Atlantic.  The hotter the water, the more fuel for a hurricane, and the stronger it will become. 

Whether it's still a category 5 or a "mere" category 4 when Melissa makes landfall in Jamaica, probably Tuesday morning, is besides the point. This is going to be a devastating, deadly blow to the island. 

It's already been raining for weeks in Jamaica.  The soil is saturated. There was flooding even before Melissa entered the picture. 

Hurricanes always dump incredible amounts of rain. You virtually always have inland flooding once they come ashore.  Most hurricanes come and go, with a forward speed of maybe 10 to 15 mph.

Melissa's forward speed was just 5 mph this morning. As a tropical storm and more recently a hurricane, it was just sitting over the Caribbean, dumping heavy rain on Haiti and Jamaica before it ever grew into the monster it is now. Melissa will only just begin to move faster over Jamaica, but it will be much too little, much too late. 

More than three feet of rain is expected on at least parts of the island, guaranteeing horrific landslides and catastrophic flooding. Jamaica is mountainous, so it's especially prone to flash flooding and heavy rains. That was the problem in western North Carolina last year with Hurricane Helene. The water just cataclysmically rushed down those slopes. Same will happen in Jamaica.

The wind will tear things apart for sure, but the flooding will be much worse.

How do you run away from flash flooding and mudslides when the wind is gusting well past 100 mph and debris is flying through the air like giant box cutters, slicing through everything?

I'm just sick about this. 

In the past, the United States would often swoop in with truly lifesaving aid when there's an extreme disaster like what is about to happen in Jamaica. But the Trump administration has turned its back on the rest of the world. So the suffering will be even worse due to the indifference of MAGA. We might send aid, but not the way we once did. 

Hurricane Melissa won't directly hit Haiti, but its torrential rains are blasting that impoverished nation on Hispaniola. This will be a nightmare for them too. We already have reports of three people killed by Melissa in Haiti and one in neighboring Dominican Republic.

We need to include Cuba in this mix. Once Melissa is done with Jamaica, it will move on to eastern Cuba. The storm might be slightly weaker than it will have been in Jamaica, but it still will be a powerhouse, with extreme flooding and seriously damaging winds in Cuba by late Tuesday and early Wednesday.

From there, Melissa will head northeastward, blasting through the Bahamas with more destruction before heading out into the open Atlantic Ocean. It might threaten Bermuda toward Friday. Then it should finally die out in the cold North Atlantic next weekend.  

Now-Category 5 Hurricane Erin Stuns With Incredibly Fast Intensification

Satellite view of Category 5 Hurricane Erin this 
afternoon. You can barely make out a pinpoint little
eye in this view. A tiny eye like this is what you'
usually see in the very strongest hurricanes. 

 Hurricane Erin stunned meteorologist and storm watchers today with one of the fastest intensifications ever seen in such a storm in the Atlantic Ocean. 

At last check shortly at mid-afternoon,  Hurricane Erin was churning about 230 miles east, northeast of San Juan, Puerto Rico with top sustained winds at a crushing 160 mph. 

Within less than 24 hours Erin went from a tropical storm with 70 mph winds to this 160 mph monster.  Its central pressure went from 996 millibars to 917 millibars. 

Preliminary data suggests Hurricane Erin intensified faster than any August hurricane on record in the Atlantic Ocean. Category 5 hurricanes are relatively rare, but have become increasingly less so.  

Also, Category 4 Atlantic Ocean storms are even more rare.  If you do get a Cat 5, they usually hit in September, the peak of hurricane season. 

"It's our new reality. Records every year. Every month. Intensification rates beyond imagination. Simply unreal," Florida meteorologist and hurricane expert John Morales said on the social media site Threads. 

The reason Morales is so worried is - you guessed it - climate change.  Hurricanes have gotten into the habit of intensifying super fast in recent years.  Climate change has warmed up oceans to make them jet fuel for hurricanes. The overall atmosphere is warmer than it once was

So, hurricanes like Beryl, Milton, Helene, Michael, Ida, Laura and others in recent years all blew up literally overnight to Category 4 and 5 monsters. 

As CBS News explains:

"Since April, 2023, global sea surface temperatures have been hotter than any period on record, and hotter oceans fuel stronger storms and amplify evaporation, strengthening hurricane winds and increasing the rain they hold. 

Storms that ramp up quickly complicate forecasting for meteorologists and make it harder for government agencies to plan for emergencies."

ERIN'S FUTURE

The fantastic news is that nobody is going to have to plan for an emergency that involves a direct hit by Hurricane Erin. That's a happy miracle. 

Erin should start to curve north pretty soon, eventually moving northwestward, east of the Bahamas Monday, then northward and northeastward far off the U.S. East Coast during the week. 

The hurricane's seeming allergy to crashing onto a shore somewhere great, but it's still a danger to landlubbers. 

The fact that Hurricane Erin is so ferocious and is expanding in size is bad news for some Caribbean Islands, and plenty of other places. The northern Leeward Islands, parts of the U.S. and British Virgin islands face winds possibly up to 70 mph and flooding rains as the storm passes to their north. 

Once Erin is off the East Coast of the United States, wind gusts of 39 mph or more - tropical storm strength, could stretch to 1,000 miles wide, from just off the Mid-Atlantic Coast to far to the southeast of Bermuda.

As it moves north and northeast next week, Hurricane Erin will probably reach its peak intensity soon. 

By tomorrow it will level off, then ever so slowly weaken but remain a formidable storm in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. We can expect several days of huge surf, rip currents and possibly some coastal flooding all up and down the East Coast of the United States and on into Canada.  

Tuesday Evening Hurricane Milton Update: Grim Monster Continues Push Toward Florida

 Hurricane Milton remains a monster. 

Visible satellite view of Hurricane Milton late Tuesday
afternoon. Click on the pic to make it bigger and easy to
see. The main central swirl around the eye looks like a buzzsaw.

After re-arranging its eye during the morning and losing just a slight bit of steam,  Hurricane Milton reasserted itself and gained almost all of its previous power. Plus, it's a larger storm now. 

As of late this afternoon, the National Hurricane Center said Hurricane Milton was a Category 5 with top winds of 165 mph. It was 480 miles southwest of Tampa, Florida and heading in that general direction. 

Yeah, it sucks to put it mildly. 

The forecast track has shifted southward by the tiniest smidge. That raises some tentative hope that it will pass a little south of Tampa Bay. 

If that were to happen - and there is absolutely NO guarantee that it will - the storm surge in Tampa Bay would be a little less than the current dire 10 to 15 feet. But don't count on it. Plus, "a little less" is still a huge danger. 

The "cone of uncertainty," which is the zone in which Hurricane Milton could make landfall, could be as far north as a spot 60 miles north of Tampa. Remember, a path over or just north of Tampa Bay would yield the worst storm surge possible in Tampa Bay, due to the topography of the land around the bay. 

On the other hand, Hurricane Milton could come ashore as far south as Cape Coral, about 100 miles south of Tampa.  

In other words, anybody who is in an evacuation zone in Florida and hasn't left yet should flee now if not sooner. 

If this evening's projected path is spot on, it would come ashore near around metro Sarasota, which has a population of about 835,000.

Also remember that Hurricane Milton is expanding in size, and that trend will continue. As of late this afternoon, tropical force storm winds extend out 140 miles from Milton's eye. That area could double by the time Hurricane Milton is approaching Florida. 

Late Tuesday afternoon forecasts have tropical force winds of 39 mph or more, and the beginnings of a storm surge should be starting not long after noon tomorrow on Florida's Gulf Coast. It will be too late to get out of way of the storm tomorrow. 

By the time Hurricane Milton reaches the Florida coast, upper level winds and an approaching front from the north will be trying to weaken the storm. But it will be too little, too late. Top winds are forecast to be 125 mph with higher gusts at landfall..

And a last minute reduction in wind speeds won't translate to a lower storm surge. 

Often when a hurricane is beginning to weaken, the south side of the storm has the higher winds. This time, it might be the north side that has the most ferocious winds. So even if the center of Milton passes a little south of Tampa, the winds would be super destructive, even if the storm surge ends up being a little less than the more dire forecasts.

So Tampa really can't win here. 

Hurricane force winds will blast across all of central Florida coast to coast overnight Wednesday and into Thursday. 

WHAT THIS MEANS FOR PEOPLE

Like I mentioned, people who did not evacuate from the storm surge area are in deep, deep trouble. 

Much like in Helene, Florida officials told people who choose not to evacuate from vulnerable areas to mark their names and date of birth on their arms with permanent marker so officials can identify their bodies later. 

Emergency managers said they were able to conduct a few water rescues in Florida during Hurricane Helene's storm surge. That won't be the case with more powerful Hurricane Milton. They told residents if don't leave by noon Wednesday, they are on their own. Nobody will come to rescue them when the water rises. 

Of course, I have to wonder about the welfare of some of the people who heeded warnings and evacuated. Some people don't have the means to evacuate from danger zones are doing. What if you don't have a car? How do you escape?  Just the cost of travel, accommodations in an evacuation can easily cost $500 or more.  A lot of  people don't have that kind of money lying around. So do they hunker down and hope for the best? 

Do people deserve to die in a hurricane for the "sin" of not having enough income?

There are shelters that have opened in public buildings on high ground for some of these storm surge refugees, but is there room for all of them?

Much of Florida is now shutting down as the storm bears down.

Tampa International Airport closed this morning. Orlando's airport shuts down tomorrow morning. Walt Disney World and Universal in Orlando as of this afternoon were staying open, perhaps unwisely, though campgrounds in wooded areas are closing for fear of falling trees.

As of this evening, nobody is allowed access to barrier islands off the southwest Florida coast.  If there are any stragglers still in homes on the barrier islands, they'll still be allowed to flee. But time is running short. 

President Biden canceled planned trips to Germany and Angola to monitor the hurricane. 

Downtown Tampa looked like a ghost town by Tuesday afternoon. The normally bustling area was almost devoid of cars and pedestrians, and businesses were either closed or shutting down operations until after the storm. 

I haven't mentioned climate change in most of these updates as I'm mostly focusing on the immediate impacts of this storm. But many aspects of Hurricane Milton are at least consistent with climate change. I'll get into that in a future post, once we catch our breath for this latest sure to be deadly and expensive calamity. 

 

For First Time, Category 5 Hurricanes This Year Everywhere That It's Possible

Satellite view of Category 5 Typhoon Mawar in the
northwestern Pacific Ocean back in May. Click
on the pic to make it bigger and easier to see.
It was one of seven Category 5 storms this year that
hit each ocean basin that can have hurricanes.

 There are seven ocean basins in the world where hurricanes can form. 

For the first time on record, Category 5 hurricanes formed in all seven of them this year, notes the Washington Post. 

Category 5 hurricanes are the strongest you can get. They have sustained winds of 157 mph or greater. You don't want one of these hitting your neighborhood. 

Luckily most of these Category 5 hurricanes so far this year have not hit populated land areas at full strength. But the fact that we got such strong hurricanes is concerning for sure. 

The reason we had these super strong hurricanes everywhere is the oceans are hot, hot, hot. A combination  of El Nino, which tends to heat up global air and oceans and climate change as pushed overall  global sea surface temperatures to record highs. 

In general, the warmer the ocean, the greater the chance a hurricane can get stronger. 

Two storms in the past week completed the list of Category 5 storms everywhere. Last Wednesday, Hurricane Jova in the eastern Pacific Ocean reached the rarified status of a super strong storm. Scientists say the fact that a category 5 hurricane formed in the Pacific during an El Nino is not that surprising. El Nino tends to create favorable conditions for strong hurricanes in the Pacific. 

Hurricane Jova eventually moved westward into colder waters and weakened. 

But then, Hurricane Lee blew up in the Atlantic Ocean last week, briefly reaching Category 5 status. El Nino usually causes hostile atmospheric conditions for hurricanes in the Atlantic Ocean. Strong upper level winds usually weaken or even blow apart hurricanes. Still, Lee managed to become a Category 5, even though those strong upper level winds kept Lee's status as king of the hill pretty brief

 As we know, Lee eventually hit Nova Scotia and Maine Saturday as a destructive post-hurricane storm. 

Other storms in this year's rogues list of Category 5 hurricanes include Cyclone Freddy in the southwestern Indian Ocean last February. (Hurricanes are called cyclones in the Indian Ocean).

At its peak, Freddy had peak winds of 165 mph.  It also broke a world record for longevity, lasting five weeks. It caused quite a lot of destruction in eastern Africa. 

Next up was Cyclone Kevin, which rapidly intensified in the southwestern Pacific Ocean at the beginning of March. (Hurricanes in this zone are also called cyclones, like similar storms in the Indian Ocean).

Kevin reached peak intensity over open water, but even after weakening, it caused a lot of flooding and damaging winds on the island of Vanuatu, northeast of Australia, as the Washington Post notes. 

In April, another ocean basin that has hurricanes dealt with a Category 5 storm. This area is known as the Australian basin, which is basically the southeastern India Ocean. Cyclone Ilsa had top wind speeds of 160 mph and caused a lot of wind damage in remote settlements in Australia.

The northern India Ocean is considered yet another, separate ocean basin prone to hurricanes. In May, Cyclone Mocha rapidly intensified not long before landfall in Myanmar and Bangladesh, killing hundreds of people. Not long before landfall, Mocha had top winds of 175 mph. 

Finally in May, Super Typhoon Mawar developed in the northwestern Pacific  Ocean, becoming the strongest hurricane so far this year and the strongest storm on record in that part of the world in May. 

Mawar had top winds of 185 mph, which would certainly blow you hat off. 

This problem is far from over. Scientist say given the right conditions, hurricanes all over the world are now prone to rapid intensification and added strength due to record high ocean temperatures. 

El Nino will eventually end and ocean temperatures will cool a bit.  But those water temperatures will still be quite a bit warmer than they once were, due to the ongoing pressure from climate change. 

Any place a Category 5 storm hits will be devastated, of course.  These intense hurricanes will just be another of a mountain of logistical and recovery nightmares brought on by our consumption of fossil fuel.